


The Second Woe Is Past

by Thymelady



Category: Sleepy Hollow (TV)
Genre: 3.18, Biblical References, Death, F/M, Funeral, Grief/Mourning, Jenny's PoV, Old friends coming together for a funeral, Religious Content, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Revelation 11, Sort of fix-it, Supernatural deaths, earthquake, ichabbie - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-25
Updated: 2016-04-25
Packaged: 2018-06-04 11:04:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,280
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6655438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thymelady/pseuds/Thymelady
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Crane and Jenny never make it to the tunnels with Pandora's box. It is then Jenny's lot to witness The Witnesses one last time. </p><p>  <i>And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city.</i><br/>Revelation 11:8</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Second Woe Is Past

**Author's Note:**

> This story has been plaguing me. And I mean that. It took ten days before I could write it and then four more before I could get myself to edit and post. Woe, indeed. 
> 
> I did religious studies once upon a time. Despite that, I wouldn't normally go for that sort of writing. But after the finale? I simply had to put things right. Not that it made me happy. But my mind won't let go.
> 
> So here is major character deaths (yes, plural) and biblical references all over. I sincerely don't want to upset or trigger anyone. So fair warning for that! 
> 
> And yes, Abbie Mills and Ichabod Crane should go together. Ichabbie forever, there is NO other way. Yes, strong enough to start an earthquake. But I do feel sorry for Jenny. 
> 
> The fic ends with a quote from Revelation 11, hopefully making sense of why I wanted to write this not quite fix-it fic.

They never make it down to the tunnels. Jenny drove like a fiend while Crane held on to the box in the backseat, probably holding it together in a combination of muscle force in his lanky body and something supernatural coming from some source within him. 

But as they jump out on the parking lot at the archives, just outside to the closest entrence to the part of the tunnels that leads to the Masonic cell, it's as if the box has decided: it's time. 

It glows worse than ever, an eerie blue and silver. Crane can't even let go of it - it seems to draw strength from him. He just stares at Jenny, and then the lid of the box starts to open up. A strange, dark mist swirls around Crane and it's like he's hollow and lit up from inside.

Jenny has seen it happen just hours before, to Abbie. Jenny screams. The box is already emitting a blood-curling noise. The blueish silver light around them expand, like an orb. They've already been noticed by some policemen outside of the police precinct. The door to the archives open up, and Sophie, Ezra and Danny are running to them; they are sucked into the orb of supernatural light.

Jenny hardly notices. Crane doesn't notice at all. He stares down into the open box in his arms. His face is full of wonder... happy even. Jenny is just screaming until Crane lifts his face to look at her and talk to her. And when he does, she hears his words within her. 

"Oh thank God... Miss Jenny, Abbie is here. She's here to take me with her."

Jenny screams. She doesn't knows that she screams to him that he doesn't fucking dare to die on them, not him too, fuck no, first Joe, then Abbie and now him? No, no, no, she screams to Crane. It all drowns in the eerie sound and light from the box. 

She fights to get to Crane and something holds her back. She doesn't understand that it's her father and Danny, both using all their strength to hold her back. 

She doesn't see Sophie shaking and crying next to her, as she understands that Abbie is dead and Crane is dying in front of them. 

Crane disintegrates before their eyes, as if his atoms are being swallowed up by the air around him, his face still lit up and full of wonder to the very last. Jenny can see his lips form Abbie's name. And Jenny still screams and screams. She doesn't know that she's hurling insults and accusations directed to both Crane and Abbie, as if Abbie could hear her. Crane doesn't hear or doesn't listen. 

And then he's gone. 

The box hovers mid-air for some moments.

And then the box explodes. 

It should hit them, fling them in every direction. It should pull them into pieces. But it is as if the globe of light they're in protects them and the box has imploded instead, the dust and the debris is on the ground. They are ensconced in a thick mist. It closes around the four of them, and Jenny is still screaming.

But the silvery light forms figures. Two well-known figures; one tall and one short. They stand there as silvery ghosts in front of them, and Jenny's voice gives up. 

The four people still alive look at what must be the spirits of Abbie and Crane. They look as they did the same day, only they stand close with arms around one another. They smile, sadly and lovingly. 

Jenny is sobbing. She's not the only one. Sophie? Maybe her father too? No one is holding her back; they all stand there. Staring. 

"Be strong, Jenny."

Jenny hears Abbie's voice. Is it in her head? Is Abbie speaking to her? She doesn't know. 

"No... not the both of you. First Joe..." she says and she knows that she's speaking because her throat is hurting from all the screaming. 

"You must let us go, Miss Jenny. It is our time," Crane says. 

Their words is strangely soothing, like a cocoon of comfort draping itself around her. The others seems to feel the same way. 

"Our 1,260 days have come and gone. All counted together with the time we spent in The Catacombs," Abbie explains. "My year there was added to Crane's as well, since our souls are as one." 

Jenny can't think of anything to say, she's crying too hard to make sense of it. 

"Miss Jenny, listen," Crane urges, "This was the second woe. It's past now, but the third is coming fast. You must be prepared. You all must," he says and looks at all four of them.

"I love you, Jenny," Abbie says and a love like Jenny has never seen shines from her sister's spirit. From Crane as well. "Joe is here with us. So is Corbin. And if I see Mama, I will tell her all about you..."

It's incredible and beautiful. And yet, Jenny's mind screams **_no_** , even if her body is calm in the realm of the other-worthly, misted light. These moments are borrowed. What will she remember? What does the others see?

"It is sad to leave you," Crane says and Jenny knows that he means it, for her sake. But Jenny saw his face when the box took him. She saw when the box took Abbie. Why not her?

"Why can't I come too?" is all she can ask.

"It's not your time," Abbie says with a sad smile. "The third woe must be battled by you. But we will meet again sooner than you think."

Jenny accepts it, even if it doesn't make sense and isn't really comforting. Will she die soon? Then why not now, with them, when she desperately wants to go? Why must she be the one to face the Apocalypse? She cries in silence. 

"It's time to go," Crane says and pulls Abbie into his embrace. Abbie turns to him and they kiss in front of them. It isn't even strange, considering the circumstances. It's beautiful, their bond and eternal unity manifested through the love they denied themselves in this life. But not in the afterlife. Everything around them is enfolded in this love, and everything on the outside shakes violently.

The orb opens up over them, it widens largely. It's cloudy above them at first, then bright lights. Too bright to see. There are sounds of winds, of choirs, of a trumpet sounding. Louder than the ears or the mind can understand. 

_God or aliens?_

Jenny wonders if her thought is blasphemous. Does it matter? Her memory of the Book of Revelation is clear enough, even in this. She sees the strange outlines in the light that surely must be close to what can be called an angel. She hears the heavenly voice, beckoning the souls of her sister and her partner to ascend. Freaking ascend to heaven. Tarrytown Psychiatric would love this. In all of it, Jenny fervently prays that she's not the only one seeing this. She doesn't want to be alone in having seen this, not having someone on her side. 

"I see it, Jennifer," she hears her father whisper next to her as he takes her hand.

Jenny sobs, relieved. 

"God, have mercy...." she manages to say, hardly knowing why. 

And in a heatbeat, everything clears. They are surrounded by police cars, policemen and shouting voices. It's a wall of blinking lights, sirens and noise like pandemonium. There are cracks in the pavement, dust from a wall of bricks behind them, it has fallen to the ground. The towers on the police precinct and the church next to it have fallen too. Was it an earthquake that shook when Abbie and Crane kissed, and the heavens opened up to them? 

But then, all Jenny sees are the two bodies on the asphalt of the parking lot. The bodies of Abbie and Crane, still locked in a loving embrace. Dusty and bloody. But their real, solid bodies and not just dissolved into nothingness. Dead, but real. As it was written in the Book of Revelation. 

It's almost Jenny's undoing to see how Crane's lips touch her sisters brow, while Abbie's face is tucked against his neck. Together. They got to go together. She came for him. 

Jenny feels that it's how it should be. All hell broke loose because they stopped hell from breaking loose. And they got to go together. They could never fully _be_ together in this life, it seems, if it threatened to start earthquakes. 

It's all nearly killing Jenny as well, as she sinks to her knees next to the dead bodies, and her heart will never really mend from this, just like she and Abbie never fully healed from seeing Moloch in the forest. Like Abbie never healed from The Catacombs. Like Crane never fully healed from waking up in the 21st century. But it had to be. It was their lot in life.

The next moment, Ezra is next to her and pulls her into his embrace, and they cry together. Danny and Sophie have fallen back into F.B.I. mode, since a large crowd has gathered, and they manage to keep people off the dead bodies on the ground with help from Abbie's former colleagues in the police, who all look shocked. 

People shout, scream and cry. Jenny hears angry voices shouting about her sister and Crane always making a mess of their town, she hears wild speculations and accusations flung against the pair on the ground. She hears people screaming in protest to the police stopping them from getting to their bodies. It's close to a real riot. 

Jenny doesn't care, as long as her father holds her. 

~*~

Four days later, they are able to hold a funeral for all three of them; Abbie, Ichabod and Joe. Feelings have calmed, even if the windows of Abbie and Crane's home were smashed and the fence around the porch nearly torn down by an angry mob. 

Now, people can't really say why they initially blamed Abbie and Crane for the earthquake. There are 7,000 more people to bury the next days; deaths claimed as the heavens opened. Approximately a tenth of the town is damaged and people are busy with the aftermath. Those that were present outside of the Archives will occasionally claim that they saw an angel in the sky. The rest praise the Lord for having survived, unlike so many others. Like the sweet, young people on today's funeral.

Only the day before, there was a group of people saying they saw Crane and Abbie outside the Archives, rising up from the ground in their real bodies. Telling the crowd something - different things for different people. And then, they rose up to heaven. There were once more talk of an angel. It has been effectively hushed up by the F.B.I. Strange things can happen to people after a natural disaster. Jenny simply re-read the Book of Revelation for the uptenth time and hoped they are at peace now. She also wished she could had witnessed them herself.

The church has lost its roof but is still full of people under large tarpaulin; colleagues of both Abbie's and Joe's work places. Policemen, Marines, agents and too many hospital personel than ought to be safe for town welfare. The historical society is there to show Crane respect, and with them several authority figures. 

Jenny wonders what holds the town together with so many present. Maybe it's the funeral itself. Maybe the rest has stopped, just this once. Maybe just this once and just this moment, life doesn't go on like before. Not in Sleepy Hollow, at least. 

That fact is not the biggest surprise. It's the presence of so many familiar faces. The Irvings are there, surrounding Jenny with their love. Hawley, fucking Hawley has the nerve to turn up and hug her for ages while she's sobbing like a child. Zoe, that poor girl who tried to date Crane and almost ended up being the bride of Franklinstein instead, hugs her as well, saying it's good that 'Abigail and Ichabod' are together at last. 

And lots of people that they have helped. She hasn't met half of them, but some are well-known to Jenny as well. Especially the two little sisters who had to deal with the tooth fairy. Even the little boy who she gave a silver dollar is there with his mother. He goes over to Jenny and hugs her. His mother explains that he begged them to go to the funeral. 

Jenny and the boy stare into each other's souls and she realises that Abbie and Crane weren't the only witnesses. They were all witnesses of The Witnesses. 

People walk by her and the look in their eyes tell Jenny that they know. They have seen things. They bore witness. 

Jenny made sure that Abbie and Crane could share the same coffin, a larger one. Joe has his own. She doesn't care what people think of that. Truth is that the bodies of her sister and Crane couldn't be separated, they had somehow merged. 

The gang from The Jeffersonian Institute in Washington, who got the job to make the autopsy and who had met Abbie and Crane around Halloween, are there as well; four people looking quite shocked. 

The tall man is apparently with the F.B.I. and the strange doctor is his wife. They both say, in different ways, that bury them together was absolutely the right thing to do. It seems to matter to them, but Jenny can't quite explain why. The strange doctor says she wish she'd had the chance to tell Mr. Crane that some things might indeed be beyond the human understanding. Her husband, the agent, says there might be time for that in the afterlife. His wife mutters that there's no need to take matters that far. Once again, Jenny's wishing that Abbie and Crane were around to explain. 

Jenny only half-listened when Danny and Sophie had told her how Abbie's and Crane's deaths, as well as the strange earthquake, were covered up. Apparently, there were forces higher up that were very helpful. Danny looks like he's never going to stop staring at the world around him in disbelief. Sophie is calmer. Her grief is deep and genuine. She has hardly left Jenny's side since the night of Abbie and Crane's deaths. They have talked and talked. In all of this, they are both grateful for having gotten closer.

Yes, the church is crowded with love. Jenny manages to do the eulogy in a haze.

Afterwards, the people who had witnessed what her sister and partner had done to save Sleepy Hollow and the world at large, meet up at Mabie's. Once there, Jenny stands up and does a much more improvised speech from her heart. 

How all of them gathered knew what Abbie and Crane were and what they did. How much it mattered. How horrible it was that they were dead, but she also tells of how they defeated death, time and time again. How death always followed them, but didn't really defeat them in the end. How each and everyone present are the ones who bore witness to what The Witnesses did. 

Her tears are rolling as she sits down again. Loving arms surround her, she doesn't really know who is there with her, but she's not alone. 

An hour later, people still haven't left. The fact that people need to be together when having lost loved ones is nothing new, likewise when people with supernatural experiences come together for comfort. Jenny sits outside of the pub, on a porch, exhausted from it all. Exhausted from shock, getting a funeral together, from grief. No matter how much help she gets, no one can lift the sorrow she has inside of her. Only she can deal with that, and it's getting too exhausting right now.

A few yards away, she hear Macey talk with the two sisters and the boy who dealt with the tooth fairy. There is a blond girl about 12 with them, she tells about being held hostage in the woods by a demon who played a flute. 

The pied piper, Jenny realises, and remembers that Abbie and Crane told her about that. That's when Hawley realised that demons were real. Jenny smiles wistfully. It's not two years ago, and yet it feels like a lifetime. 

The kids are exchanging stories of their encounters, Jenny realises. She's glad. If only she had had someone to talk to like that after seeing Moloch in the forest. Abbie had finally come through. Her father had finally come through. All that is left to do now is to go up to the cabin and spread Joe's ashes. And then she has to go back to the fight. 

The third woe, Crane had said. Jenny has a small New Testament in her purse. She has read the words several times these last days. Even from Washington's Bible. 

Revelation, chapter 11. Verses 3 to 14 make sense; it had pretty much happened like that. But the rest? The seventh angel? The two and forty nations? Jenny has more questions than answers. But what else is new in the Apocalyptic fight? This is her lot in life. One day, she will be with her loved ones again. Until then, she will make them proud.

Revelation 11:3-14 (King James Version)  
3 And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed in sackcloth.  
4 These are the two olive trees, and the two candlesticks standing before the God of the earth.  
5 And if any man will hurt them, fire proceedeth out of their mouth, and devoureth their enemies: and if any man will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed.  
6 These have power to shut heaven, that it rain not in the days of their prophecy: and have power over waters to turn them to blood, and to smite the earth with all plagues, as often as they will.  
7 And when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and kill them.  
8 And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified.  
9 And they of the people and kindreds and tongues and nations shall see their dead bodies three days and an half, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves.  
10 And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another; because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt on the earth.  
11 And after three days and an half the Spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet; and great fear fell upon them which saw them.  
12 And they heard a great voice from heaven saying unto them, Come up hither. And they ascended up to heaven in a cloud; and their enemies beheld them.  
13 And the same hour was there a great earthquake, and the tenth part of the city fell, and in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand: and the remnant were affrighted, and gave glory to the God of heaven.  
14 The second woe is past; and, behold, the third woe cometh quickly.


End file.
